Lufthansa backs fairytale project

14 August 2006

Lufthansa has given its backing for the EU project “Fairy Tales before Take-off” which aims to be an imaginative
promotion of multilingualism at airports.

Nine story tellers from eight European countries are taking centre stage at Frankfurt Airport where they will be introduced to passengers, big and
small, in a presentation organised by Lufthansa in cooperation with the Goethe
Institutes in Frankfurt and Brussels. The stage is set in departures concourse A in
Terminal 1 for fables, legends and fairy tales from around the world, which are to
be recited and enacted by story tellers in their mother tongue in German, Danish,
Gaelic, Finnish, French, Dutch, Czech and Hungarian. “We want to span a bridge with
this event between languages, cultures and countries,” said Lufthansa Station
Manager in Frankfurt Andreas Döpper. “Our aim is to stimulate the curiosity of our
passengers and encourage them playfully and imaginatively to take an interest in
foreign languages.”

“Fairytales before Take-off” will be narrated by Suse Wei§e from Germany, E.
Katharina Ritter from Austria, Michal Nesvadba from the Czech Republic, Mariane
Josefsen from Denmar, Heli Aaltonen from Finland, Nathalie Bondoux from France,
Niall de Bœrca from Ireland, the Hugarian András Faragó and Mia Verbee?len from
Belgium. Each of them will recite stories and fairy tales in their own language. In
a very special way: The story tellers will appear without props, relying purely on
their voice and gestures to keep the action flowing. Among the fairy tales are
classics like Little Red Ridinghood and the Bremen Town Musicians as well as lesser
known sagas and legends.

Attractive prizes beckon in a nine-language Internet quiz at www.ciceb.org/quiz. Also on offer is a brochure on fairytales and
languages depicting Europe’s common cultural heritage and promoting multilingualism.

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Aside from support from diverse cultural institutes, “Fairy tales before Take-off”
enjoys the backing of the SOCRATES / LINGUA 1 programme at the European Commission
for Education and Culture. The Consortium of European Cultural Institutes in Belgium
(CICEB) is also contributing towards realisation of the EU project. The story
tellers have already appeared at Brussels, Prague, Budapest and Helsinki airports.
Next on their tour after Frankfurt are Copenhagen and Dublin airports.
Lufthansa has been nominated in this year’s World Travel Awards in the category of Europe’s Leading Airline.